


save yourself, i am bitter to the bone (and i'm growing rather fond of the wandering alone)

by enbyreneewalker



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-21
Updated: 2021-01-21
Packaged: 2021-03-13 13:34:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28904220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enbyreneewalker/pseuds/enbyreneewalker
Summary: There’s a stag, in your dreams.His body is covered in feathers, black like crows singing their death song to little insignificant men in navy jackets adorned with yellow letters. You stand amongst them. Only you listen. Only you know.or; a study of symbolism in a sort-of poem
Relationships: Will Graham & Abigail Hobbs, Will Graham & Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham & The Stag





	save yourself, i am bitter to the bone (and i'm growing rather fond of the wandering alone)

**Author's Note:**

> honestly i wrote this for a class and then it became This
> 
> i'm not really in the hannibal fandom right now, but the symbolism of the show is really interesting to me and this was really fun to write
> 
> title is from for the departed by shayfer james

There’s a stag, in your dreams.

  


His body is covered in feathers, black like crows singing their death song to little insignificant men in navy jackets adorned with yellow letters. You stand amongst them. Only you listen. Only you know.

  


_ “See?”  _ the man on the floor asks, his chest rattling as he looks at you and the dying girl and that  _ thing  _ that wears humanity like a suit.

  


The gun was in your hands.

  


There’s a  _ clip-clop _ of hooves on a tiled floor. The stag looks into the room of you and a sleeping girl and a woman and a book, a voice of light against the all-encompassing darkness _.  _ Somewhere, elsewhere, a man drops a teacup, if only to see what would happen.

  


You open your eyes. The stag is gone, leaving you and the girl and the  _ beep _ of the machines and the soft voice of the pure reading to the infected. Somewhere, elsewhere, time slows and the teacup does not fall.

  


The stag walks behind you, haunting your steps like shadows haunt your heart. The swirling red-blue  _ red-blue _ light beats him back. You open your eyes. This doesn’t feel like a dream.

  


Maybe it never was.

  


There’s a statue in an office, a stag gilded in black like shadows themselves cling to the metal. You stand with the man more person-suit than person, silver lies dripping from his silver tongue, spinning the silver web you will never know you are caught in, not until it’s too late.

  


You blink.

  


There’s a statue on the floor, a stag gilded in drying red and strangling black like death itself clings to the metal.

  


_ “Have you ever seen blood in the moonlight, Will? It appears quite black.” _

  


You open your eyes.

  


Shadows swirl and gather in the woods, soaking the stag’s feathers with songs of death and darkness and deception. 

  


There’s a gun in your hands.

  


_ “Do you ever hunt?” _

  


The rifle raises.

  


_ “I fish.” _

  


The trigger is squeezed.

  


_ “It’s the same thing, isn't it? One you stalk, the other you lure.” _

  


The stag bolts.

  


_ “Were you more of a fisherman, or a hunter?” _

  


Moonlight paints blood coating the trees black.

  


_ “My dad taught me how to hunt.” _

  


There was no stag to be found, only blood and feathers, shadow and death, red and black and red is black on the forest floor.

  


_ “No, that’s not what I was asking. All those girls your dad killed… Did you fish, or did you hunt, Abigail?” _

  


That  _ thing, _ free of his person-suit, rises, antlers spun of silver lies and gilded by shadows atop his head.

  


_ “I was the lure.” _

  


Somewhere, elsewhere, the teacup shatters.


End file.
